


in a sky full of song

by Weboury



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Canon Continuation, Canon-Typical Injuries, F/M, Fluff, I suppose, POV Jaime Lannister, but nothing on screen, it starts with canon and when canon stops I take over, not what i meant to finish but it's done so here it is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:55:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24260011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Weboury/pseuds/Weboury
Summary: Jaime Lannister looks up frequently, especially to the sky. This is what he found every time he did.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 28
Kudos: 72





	in a sky full of song

**Author's Note:**

> title comes of course from Florence + the Machine's "Sky Full of Song" because i'm a soft bitch and not subtle at all. this story is unbeta'ed.

Jaime closed his eyes and allowed the warmth to spread through him. The birds sang, his clothes raked. 

He was free. 

Opening them again, his head raced to absorb the sky, solid and wide. The hairs on his arms pricked up.

He was _alive_.

The woman grunted. His gaze darted to hers, and bright blue eyes watched him, calculating. He shot her an innocent grin, ready to pounce.

It was time to go home.

** 

She was maddeningly stubborn, that was for sure. 

_Fucking pig-headed wench_ , Jaime assessed, as she pushed him into the river again. Sharpness cut through his scalp, from rock and water both.

She yanked him up. Her hair was a mess, her brow scrunched up in frustration. Behind her, Jaime saw gray swirling clouds. Lifeless, they seemed, when her blotchy, freckled face was so close. 

"Yield!" she screamed. 

His blood was rushing.

“Yield!”

Jaime laughed through the pain. She pushed him down again. 

She was strong, too. Stupid ugly cow as she was. She was strong. 

* 

"Would _you_ do that, if you were a woman?" 

Jaime rolled his eyes. Deep on the woods there was not much sun, and no reason to lie. If he were a woman, he'd be Cersei. 

"I'd make them kill me." 

She kept silent, as if that was a good enough answer.

Jaime huffed and kicked their horse to a trot. 

** 

Jaime lay on the grass, his rotting hand hanging loosely from the cord on his neck, his graceless stump held tightly to his chest. 

He trembled—hadn't stopped trembling—from the fire that pulsated down his arm and spread through him.

Meanwhile, the night sky shone down upon him. Long ago, as a boy, he'd learned the constellations. Jaime traced the shapes with his mind. The King’s Crown, the Stallion, the Swan. He used to name them all before, during the long nights. Beautiful. Familiar.

"Jaime." A whisper. "Jaime, what are you doing?" 

From the corner of his eye she leaned down to loom over him. Even in the scarce light he could make out the bruises, the swollen lips darkened with dried blood. Straw-colored hair, dirty as his was, fell over her rough face. And her eyes... 

The shy moonmaid twinkled in the sky.

He wanted to huff a laugh. 

"Dying," he murmured. 

"No," she said, simply. "No, you must live." 

*

Jaime needed her to understand.

"Go away inside." If only she _listened_ , for fuck's sake. "Think of anything. Renly, if you love him. Your Sapphire Isle. _Anything_. Go away inside." 

Jaime could see in the fierceness of her brow that she wouldn't. _Stupid, stubborn wench_.

Her screams didn't fade as she fought them off, as they dragged her away. 

Jaime whirled his head in circles. No moon, no stars. And still, it all burned red and green. His chest tightened.

He forced a deep breath and yelled.

***

When Jaime's eyes fluttered open, the heat of the bath had faded from his limbs.

The roof remained full of mist, like early morns in the battlefield. The stone floor was wet and clammy. His legs would not obey him, so he stayed there, limp and cold. Above him peered the guards and Maester Qyburn, talking nonsense among themselves. And then there was Brienne.

Brienne watched him with gentle concern. 

He considered for a moment where her towel had gotten to.

***

Watching her eyes lit up was like watching the sun rise.

“Valyrian steel,” she appraised.

“It would please me if you called it Oathkeeper.”

She was going to protest, _of course_ she was. So he sent her away.

***

Even fell. His good hand gripped his sword until it went numb.

His Lord Father, grimacing; Tyrion, lost; soldiers searching like dogs. And Brienne. Gone.

Jaime refused to look up at the gods. He looked out to the stars instead.

***

Connington’s blood shone dark in the moonlight. 

Brienne’s blood had also turned trickle black with dust, as they had stood before the bear’s remains, what seemed like a lifetime ago.

“Call her by her name,” Jaime snarled. “Call her Brienne.” 

Fire lit Connington’s face as he spat. Jaime knew it had been his stare, and whatever flames Connington had found there, that kept the man on the ground.

****

Snow drifted down over the Riverlands.

Jaime stood on the yard, staring at it. Its whiteness. Its menace. 

Children’s and men’s giggles reverberated around him. He longed for two hands, so he could make a proper snowball. Hoped that there could be more time to produce another harvest. Wished that winter had not arrived so soon, and for Brienne. 

He wished Brienne could be there to see the dancing snowflakes, too.

***

The moonmaid peered through the clouds that night. He hadn’t expected to see her so far north. Jaime grunted. 

_Stubborn fool_ , he thought, and nestled himself around Brienne. _What use is a maimed man to your wounds?_

He clung to her, letting the fire of his temper warm them both.

***

The storm raged. It raged and raged, all howls and screams.

Jaime squelched through, knee-deep in snow.

He looked up, absurdly, in search of light. There was only winter. 

It was his fault. He’d let her run off, take on the ice corpses alone, and to save what? A message, a bag of grain? _Me?_

He growled. 

She’d have her sword sheathed, wherever she was. He held to the pommel of its twin, gripped until his hand went numb. 

She’d want to not call attention to herself, he reasoned. In this snowstorm he could pass her by and wouldn’t know it. She’d have only her armor. With some dumb luck, her horse. And her sword, of course. Lit by blue fire that would not warm her. The Northerners called it old magic. 

Once, he had wished she could see the snowflakes. What a fool he’d been.

*

They’d be mad at him, he pondered as he stretched his flesh hand. Brienne would be furious.

He was going to die trying to save her here in the bloody arse of winter. Two magic swords, gone in a woosh of his delirium. 

Orders had been given. They had discussed this. They had _agreed_ on this. 

Jaime glanced up and took a solemn breath.

_Fuck it._

He unsheathed Widow’s Wail. Blue fire rippled along the red of his steel, forcing back—just for a bit—the never-ending nothingness around him.

** 

Widow’s Wail slashed and plundered in his trembling arm. He knocked one of the monsters with the golden hand and impaled it with his blade. He kicked and yanked and cut, cut, cut with grunts and sword until the last one fell. His knees gave out, and he followed them to the ground.

Jaime shivered as he took the deafening darkness above him. The long night. _The long hassle, more like._

Fumbling for the hilt of his sword, he brought it to his chest, marveling one last time at the foolishness of heatless fire.

A snarl snapped his eyes open, and then the weight of the night was upon him. His sword scurried to the snow as he fought the maw open before him. The white creature bit and tore, and Jaime knew, he _knew_. 

The light of his sword flickered at one side. He brought Brienne to his mind, and he kept her there.

*

“Jaime?” A whisper. 

He followed it, his sight adjusting. She looked down upon him, eyes twinkling, brow furrowed. One of her hands went to his chest, the other to his head. 

“Jaime?” Brienne leaned closer. “Can you hear me?”

He nodded and coughed. It made his whole body throb.

“You’re safe,” she rubbed his forehead with a calloused thumb. “We’re on a cave.” 

He knew it to be true. Smoke filled his frozen nose, and wherever the fire was, it made her glow in yellows and oranges. His gaze trailed along her reddened freckles, her full lips, her disarrayed hair. It was longer than ever, falling over her neck. He felt the urge to tuck it behind her ear.

“I saw them,” she straightened, a monument to disapproval. “The flames.” 

He tried to chuckle, but all that came out was another cough. “Good.” 

His voice was a thread.

“You could’ve died,” she shook her head. 

Jaime shrugged from where he lay in the ground, managing only an awkward wiggle.

“I’ve almost died before.” 

“It was incredibly foolish. I told you—”

“Brienne.”

“What?”

He gave her a weak, smug smirk.

“I still found you.” 

She gave him a laugh so honestly offended it swelled up his heart. She patted his chest, gentle, gentle, always gentle. He allowed the warmth to run through him. 

***

Brienne bent down to pick up a daisy, and held it up to measure it in the sunlight. She basked in the flower, as if it held some big secret. The sky behind her eclipsed under the blue of her eyes, the sun shied from the brightness of her smile. 

When she turned to him, Jaime had to blink. An obstinate grasshopper reminded him he was sitting uncomfortably on a meadow.

“Are you ready?” he scrambled to his feet with help from a cane. She watched him with an amused look. They’d argued about this, too. But he had followed her across the Riverlands, up and down the Northern plains, and he was determined to walk behind her all the way to her castle. He was sure the hills of Tarth would come to respect him, in time. He’d told her so. 

She had called him stubborn. He had laughed. 

“Brienne,” he repeated, softer this time. “Are you ready?”

Brienne looked down at his face, then up to the clouds, and back at him.

“Yes.” Her voice was clear, and she cupped his face in a caress. “It’s time to go home.”

Jaime didn’t know how to tell her that right there, in her hands, he already was.


End file.
